Hotel on the
Corner of Bitter and Sweet
Jamie Ford
This book has a very good title. Henry, the protagonist, has had a life with
happiness and disappointments, and much of the setting involves an old hotel in
Seattle. The title sums up many aspects
of the story.
The setting is Chinatown and Japantown in Seattle during
WWII, and there is some history to be learned here. The problem with the book is explained in an
interview with the author at the end, in which Ford explains his writing
process. He says that as he writes, he focusses
on the ending, and that is the impression I got as I read. Ford is trying so hard to move along his plot,
that he has not allowed his characters to develop. They are just implements to move the plot along. They have been assigned certain traits and speak
the lines assigned to them, but they are not complex or interesting. Their interactions serve to move the plot in
the direction Ford has determined, and they all turn out to be pretty dull
puppets. Even the plot is not well
handled because there is a lot of action concerning the protagonist's proposed
trip to China and that goes nowhere. Similarly,
there is supposed to be some friction between the main character, Henry, and
his son, Marty, but there is nothing substantive to indicate the source of this
problem.
I think that Ford does
not have an interest in his characters beyond their contribution to his plot. He decided to write a book about star-crossed
lovers set during WW II when the government was relocating Japanese Americans
to internment camps. He did some
historical research, but research and a plot don't make a novel. The book reads like a classroom project, and Ford
needs more lessons in character development.
Or he needs more wisdom and insight about the human condition to move
beyond stereotypes.
In brief, Henry is a Chinese American enrolled in an
all-white school. He has to work in the
school cafeteria and there he meets Keiko, a Japanese American also at the
school on a "scholarship."
Their friendship blossoms into romance, despite the opposition of
Henry's father, for whom the Japanese atrocities in China are vivid memories. There
is conflict between Henry and his father. Keiko and her family are relocated to
an internment camp, the two school children lose touch, Henry marries Ethel, a
Chinese American, they have a child, Marty, Ethel dies, and Henry's thoughts go
back to his first girlfriend. The
setting recreates the international nature of Seattle before the war, and the
jazz music popular at the time. There
are two characters of some interest: Sheldon, a black trombone player, and Mrs.
Beatty who runs the school cafeteria.
An irritant to me are the "Reading Group
Questions" at the back. The writer
and publisher are assuming too much about the quality of their book and too
little about the intelligence of their readership. On what basis was it decided that this book
would be good material for a reading group?
